It was a sigh of relief once we had settled the hotel venue. Choosing from the many hotels was a pretty big challenge itself, but next up was an even daunting task: choosing a bridal shop from the NUMEROUS out there…
I had the vague-est idea of where to start. The decision was primarily mine, cos “the bride is the one who’s wearing the fancy dresses and jewelry, while the guy basically chooses from a few suit designs and the colors.” *hmm…* Not much help from darling there. =P
After struggling around for a while, I finally made some headway. =)
- Had bought local bridal magazines to get some wedding ideas. Loved that they had a great useful compilation of Singapore’s major bridal shops! Great starting point!
- Shortlist shops I’m interested in.
- Nice name (? Gut feeling?)
- Style of shop as reflected on their shop advertisements
- -GOOD- The elegant, classy and sweet-looking styles
- -BAD- Too flowery / arty-farty / lacy / loud / matured look
- -BAD- Too simple / plain-looking ones
- Past user comments on SingaporeBrides and StyleWedding online forums
- -BAD- Shops with complains/criticisms about service, gown selections, etcetc.
- General style of photos (from the shops’ websites and customers’ blogs/online albums)
- -GOOD- Semi-posed styles, balance between a more artistic feel and casual natural feel.
- -BAD- Too casual, totally non-posed shots
Two large-scale wedding fairs were coming up very soon at that time, and the deadline for registration was coming up soon! With this push factor, it was the apt time to start the darlings’ engine running. No more procrastination! ^_^ Since the wedding fairs usually had good promotions, discounts, and freebies to those who signed up on that day, we decided to target those boutiques who were showcasing at the fairs first. If we saw something that we liked during our recce, we could sign up for the show and sign the package there. 
We narrowed down to 5 stores, and split them into 2 days to check the shops out at their outlets after work. WARNING: Bridal shops are generally quite pushy, trying to keep you within the shop, look at more pictures, try on gowns, negotiate and sign on the spot! Be PERSISTENT to leave and get back to them later.
After all our visits, Bridal Zone won our unanimous vote.
- Gave us the most value-for-money with the most attractive package offer, guaranteed to be their best deal offered at the wedding fair too.
- We were really impressed with the pictures taken – very nice touch-up and enhancements, and amazing shots taken simply on local grounds!
- Other nice and unique miscellaneous items:
- Portrait photo designs had the usual single big picture, and the 3 in 1. But also had the option of the long landscape pictures. The samples we saw were really nice!
- Photo frame options for the table top also had some special designs on top of the usual plain 8R table top
- Mini-album was upgraded from the plain full page album of the selected pictures, to a storybook design, digital print in a separately designed layout made by a company in Taiwan. Cool!
- Many many more deals… check out our wedding package details for more information.
- Oh yes, another IMPORTANT factor, BZ was *honest*. None of the other shops we visited admitted to having any wedding shows coming up, although we already knew from magazine advertisements that they were having a booth at one of the two upcoming big bridal shows.
Liars!!! Only Grace at BZ had the courtesy to tell us abt the upcoming show, and even offered to give us the freebies and additional poses that is usually only available at the show.
The very moment we stepped out of the last of the shops we were looking at, our choice was clear. We called Grace at Bridal Zone, and went down immediately to sign the package that very day. (We even got 2 additional poses for the album in the package! 
)
